Supplies

Round 1

Using GREEN yarn, make a magic circle. Chain 3 (this counts as your first dc), then do 11 more dc into the ring.

You will end up with 12 stitches in total.

Slip stitch (ss) into the top of the original chain 3 (see image 4) and fasten off using an invisible join to keep things as neat as possible.

Use a yarn needle to weave in your ends (image 5). Pull the magic ring tight and sew that end around the first round (see image 6)

Round 2

Attach RED yarn in any space between stitches (see image 7 and 8 above), NOT into the top of a stitch, and chain 3. DC in the same space, then do 2 dc in each space around. You will end up with a total of 24 stitches.

SS into the top of the starting chain and fasten off with an invisible join.

Please note that if you prefer to do this round into the top of the stitches instead of into the spaces you can, I just like the star-like look of crocheting into the spaces) This next round is where we are going to start turning our circle into a triangle by adding corners and using different height stitches.

Round 3

Attach WHITE yarn in the top of any stitch, chain 3, then do 2 more dc in the same stitch. Chain 2, then do 3 more dc in the same stitch (this is our first corner of the triangle). See images 12 and 13 above.

[skip 1 stitch, do 3 hdc in the next stitch, skip 1 stitch then do 3 sc in the next stitch, skip 1 and do 3 hdc in the next stitch, skip one and do 3 dc, ch2, 3dc in the next stitch] Repeat [ ] 2 more times around. Slip stitch into the top of the starting chain 3 and fasten off. You should now have a slightly rounded looking triangle (see image 14 below)

Round 4

Attach GREEN yarn in any corner and chain 3. Then crochet one more dc, ch2, 2 dc in same corner. Then dc in each stitch until you get to the next corner and repeat the 2dc, ch2, 2dc in that corner. Continue around, doing same in 3rd corner and long the straight side. Slip stitch to top of starting chain 3 and finish off. See images 15 and 16 above.

Rounds 5 and 6

Attach yarn in any corner, chain 1, sc, ch2, 2sc in same corner. See image 17 above. SC all the way around doing the 2sc, ch2, 2sc in the other 2 corners. Repeat for Round 6 and finish off. See image 18 below

Joining the bunting

Using the white yarn, chain 15.

Join your chain to the top right corners of one of your triangles, on the WRONG side (image 19).

SC long the top of the triangle, then chain 8, attach next triangle as before and continue.

After reaching end of last triangle, chain 15 and finish off, leaving a longish tail.

Attach the green yarn and single crochet along the entire length of the bunting (image 20 above) Finish off.

Add some tassels to the bottom loop to pretty things up.

Of course, you don’t have to only use this for Christmas, you can play with the colours and make one for any occasion. Here’s a brightly coloured one I was playing with last week.

And, as always, I’d be majorly happy if you’d share this post, here’s a perfectly sized pin for you to share 🙂

Ah, the simple granny square. Love it or hate it, it’s a staple of crochet design, with countless variations.

It’s also a great introduction to the concept of crocheting “in the round” as opposed to in rows that you work back and forth, turning your work at the end of each row.

So, without further ado, let’s get to it!

What you’ll need to crochet a granny square

Crochet hook – I recommend a 4mm or 5mm

Yarn – anything you like, but to learn I recommend a solid colour in a DK / sport / 8ply sort of weight

Yarn needle – for weaving in ends.

Starting off

To start a granny square, or any crochet in-the-round project, you need to make a loop. There are 2 ways of doing this, a magic ring or chaining a few stitches then slip stitching into the first chain.

I highly recommend learning how to master the magic circle, and I highly recommend this video tutorial from PlanetJune which shows the technique very clearly for both right and left handed crocheters. Click the link just above to see the left handed version.

This can take a few goes to get the feel of it, but, trust me, it’s something you really should learn, and once you get the hang of it you’ll be doing them in 1.5 seconds flat!

The other method to create a ring is to chain 4, then slip stitch into the 1st chain you made. You then work your starting double crochet stitches into the middle of the circle. Here’s a video from monkeysee.com that shows you exactly how to do this

OK, so now that you’ve got your starting ring made, the next step is to crochet your first round. A traditional granny square is made using groupings of 3 double crochet stitches (dc), so to make your first round you will need to chain 3 (this will count as your first dc) and then make 2 more dc stitches into your starting circle. See images 1 and 2 below.

Then you chain 2, this leaves a space that will become the corner for this first round. See image 3.

Do 3 dc into the central ring, then chain 2, a total of 3 more times. You should then have 4 groupings of 3 dc stitches each separated by 2 chain stitches.

Now you’re going to finish off this round by slip stitching into the top chain of the chain 3 you started this round with. See image 4 for exact placement of this slip stitch.

Round 2

From this point on you will only be working into the chain 2 spaces, so you need to get over to the first chain 2 space (the corner) to start, so I like to just slip stitch across. By this I mean you do a slip stitch into the first stitch after you finished the last round, then into the next, and then into the corner ch2 space.

As you are now in a corner, you need to create another corner. To do this you chain 3 as your first dc crochet 2 dc, chain 2, then 3 more dc all into that first corner space. Do this in each of the 3 remaining chain 2 corner spaces. Do NOT do any chains when moving from one corner to another. Some patterns do suggest to do a chain or 2 here, but I find that it leads to a sloppy, less square granny square.

You will end up with 8 groupings of 3dc, with a chain 2 space in each corner. See image 5 below.

Slip stitch into the top (3rd) stitch of the starting chain 3 to close off round 2.

Round 3

Slip stitch across to the first corner and chain 3. This counts as your first dc. See image 6 below.

You are again in a corner, so, as you have done before, chain 3, 2dc, chain 2, 3dc in the corner space. Insert your hook into the next space and do 3dc. As this is not a corner this is all you do in this space. Your next space is another corner, so 3dc, ch2 and 3dc. I can SO tell you’re getting the hang of this, now, aren’t you??

Do this all the way around until you’ve completed the round, and finish off as usual, by slip stitching into the top of the starting chain. See image 7 below.

Round 4

All you do from this point on is to repeat the previous round.

All middle of the row spaces get a grouping of 3dc, and all corners get 3dc, ch2, 3dc.

See image 8 below.

In this sample round I stopped at 4 rounds, but you can make a granny square as large as you like. I’m currently working on a giant one that is going to be a bed spread for my queen sized bed! It’s not difficult, you just keep doing the same thing around and around and around!

I will warn you that when you start getting to 15 rounds plus sometimes your square can start to look a bit wonky because you’re always going around in the same direction. One way to lessen this effect is to occasionally turn your entire project when starting a new round and start working in the opposite direction.

But, I digress.

As I said, I crocheted a total of 4 rounds in this sample. When you finish off your last slip stitch to close the final round, cut your yarn leaving a 10 – 15cm tail. Pull this tail through the loop and thread the tail onto a yarn needle. Using the needle, weave your tail in and out on the back side of the granny square. I am a bit of a hard-core weaver-inner, so I like to do this really firmly, and sew it in back and forth in a few directions. You’ll also want to pull the centre magic circle (and yes, I KNOW you started it this way, didn’t you?) nice and tight and sew in the tail end around and around and then snip the end off. See image 9 below.

And there you have it – just like in image 10, you have made a traditional crocheted granny square. TA DAH!! Well done, you!

Next time I’ll be showing you how to do a solid granny square, with out the gaps a traditional one has. I know, you can’t wait, can you?

Once you’ve tried out this tutorial I’d love it if you’d comment below if you still have any questions, or if you had any problems, or if you totally rocked it first time and are wanting to shout out loud at how proud you are!

Some Gorgeous Yarns That Make Me Happy

This is just a very quick post to share some gorgeous, festive, yarny eye candy! I was making these images up on Canva to share on Pinterest, and they were just so darned pretty I thought I’d share them here, too.

All of the images are clickable if you want to find out where you, too, can find the Happy that such Pretty Things can bring, lol!

Please note that these are affiliate links, so if you choose to make a purchase via them I may receive a tiny commission at no cost to you. You can see my full disclosure and privacy policy HERE.

2eb5b55abd60a7331398eac99e1710d29c3ab41c9fed9130c6

Subscribe NOW to receive your free printable gift tag

This free downloadable and printable gift tag lets the recipient of your amazing handmade crochet or knitted gift know that it was HANDMADE WITH LOVE, and gives care instructions. Print it out on any paper you choose and use it over and over again.

Hi there. I hope you enjoyed Part 1, where I talked about the various types of hooks and yarns that are out there. I also hope I didn’t send you broke on online shopping sprees, as I know first hand how that can go!

This time I’m going to review and share a few photo and video based tutorials for the Absolute Beginner at crochet, and I hope you find them as useful as I did!

Getting Started with Crochet

The first thing you’re going to need to do is learn how to hold your hook and yarn, how to make your starting loop and how to do a simple chain. This may sound simple, but I swear it was the hardest thing for me to wrap my tiny brain and fumbly fingers around. It just didn’t FEEL right, but I’m here to tell you that if you persevere it WILL get easier and feel more natural. Please believe me on this. Also, there are many different ways to hold your hook and yarn, so try out a few of them until you find one that works for you.

OK, the first resource I want to share with you is this one from the delightful Mikey at The Crochet Crowd. Mikey explains the technique so simply, slowly, and above all – patiently! I’d recommend watching it through first, before picking up a hook, and then replaying it again, pausing as you need to to try out the various stages of getting started.

If you’re more comfortable with photographs rather than a video, then you might find Amy’s tutorials atThe Spruceto your liking. She goes into fabulous detail on the various grips, and includes instruction and photos for both left and right hand crocheters.

Another fabulous series of video tutorials is available courtesy of Sarah-Jayne at Bella Coco. She has SO many video tutorials available, including one for those of you who are starting from scratch. Her entire website is an absolute visual delight – it’s just so darned pretty! Just one thing to clarify, Sarah Jayne is from the UK, which has slightly different terminology for the various crochet stitches than in the US. I’ll talk more about this in my next post, but for now, this video just covers a starting chain, so there shouldn’t be any confusion between US and UK terminology.

Another resource which I haven’t personally tried, but have heard rave reviews about is Olivia from Hopeful Honey. I was chatting on a beginner crochet Facebook group the other day, and a new member was asking for suggestions on beginner tutorials. Hopeful Honey was mentioned quite a few times, as well as the ones above. I’ve since watched them, and can see why! Olivia’s videos are also very slow paced, and go into a lot of detail. I can’t wait to watch some of her others.

The instructables.com site has another great tutorial that’s a bit of a mix of photos and mini videos which is also very easy to follow. I especially like how it’s not a full video that you have to manually pause, but mini animations that replay again and again. The written instructions are also very clear.

There are many other tutorials out there, but I think these are some of the best, and should give you all you need to get started.

I would highly recommend just repeating the slip knot and simple chain over and over again until you find a way of holding your hook and yarn that just feels right to you. Test both knife and pencil holds, and holding yarn around various fingers, and you will find that one particular technique is going to feel a lot more natural. Remember the concept of muscle memory (see definition here on Wiki), and you can be confident that, with enough repetition, even that which feels awkward at first can become second nature after enough repetition.

This post does contain affiliate links, if you happen to make any purchases via them I may receive a small commission at no extra cost to you. Please note I only recommend products I use and love. For more details please see DISCLOSURE.

Happy Chaining!

Tx

Subscribe NOW to receive your free printable gift tag

This free downloadable and printable gift tag lets the recipient of your amazing handmade crochet or knitted gift know that it was HANDMADE WITH LOVE, and gives care instructions. Print it out on any paper you choose and use it over and over again.

Yes, it’s that time of year again. We’re only a few days away from the first half of the year being done, which means it’s officially time to start thinking about your Christmas crochet projects. Yup, I went there. I said the C word. Did you know that as of the day I’m writing this it’s now only 183 days until Christmas? Time to get that hook in gear!

I’m going to be running a series of these with lists of all free patterns. Today we’re starting with afghans, blankets and throws to give your home that warm and festive feeling. All of these patterns are free, and most are suitable for those of beginner to intermediate level. All of the images are also clickable and will take you directly to the pattern page.

We’ll start with this gorgeous Victorian Ornaments Afghan by Caron on Yarnspiration. I love the unusual shapes used to make up this project, and I”m putting it first on my list. I tend to go for slightly less traditional festive colours, myself, so will have to have a think about what to use for this little beauty.

Next on the list is this very popular Crochet Peppermint Swirl Afghan Pattern from TheWhoot. I’ve seen this around Pinterest done in a few different colours. Again, with my love of mad, bright colours, I think I may try this one in whole range of colours. Then again, it does look so good in the pure red and white. Hmmmm, minty crocheted deliciousness in any colour!

Number 3 in the countdown is this cuddly holly-inspired throw from Freepatterns.com. I do love me some free patterns! Again, this is a very traditional style in some very traditional colours, but I think you could have lots of fun playing around with colours on this one if you felt like putting your own personal twist on it. It’s a really simple granny square design, would be perfect for beginners.

Now, this next one is one of my favourites, and I’m going to be giving this pattern a serious read, because I just love the plaid effect. It’s another design from Caron, find all the details here.

For those of you who are into the whole C2C craze, this one’s for you! It’s a bright and cheerful Christmas afghan courtesy of MakeAndDoCrew, and it comes with graphs, tutorials, and video support if it’s your first attempt at one of these. I still haven’t tried a graphgan yet, but it’s on my to-do list!

What I love about this throw is that it reminds me of quilting, which is something I first got into a few years ago and love nearly as much as I love crochet. The downside is that I”m not very good at it, oops, so for now I’m sticking with my trusty crochet hook. This is a seriously pretty Christmas Star Throw which is a freebie courtesy of Red Heart. Isn’t that nice of them?

Next we have a set of cushion covers with a matching throw, and it’s all about Christmas presents! The pattern is available HERE on Ravelry as a free pdf download.

Apologies to anyone with young kids, but, Do You Wanna Build a Snowman? Yes, yes, of course you do, and here’s a cuddly blankie that will keep every snowman fan in your family warm as toast and with a happy smile on their face. It is also a bit of relief from the whole red, green and white colour theme, which I’ve gotta say, is starting to get to me. This Crochet Snowman Granny Square blanket is a great, simple design, and is also FREE from Crochetforyoublog.com.

Now we have the Holiday Hearts Throw, which is another lovely free pattern from Red Heart. Aren’t you just feeling the love? I know I am. Heart motifs are something I’ve always found a bit tricky to do, for some strange reason, so I’m glad this one has nice, basic instructions!

Lastly, but by no means least is this stunning “Merry Little Throw” Join As You Go hexie throw which was published last year as a CAL over at Fibreflux. What’s great about this is that, because it’s a CAL, there are seriously detailed instructions with a zillion photos and even some videos to help you through it.

So, there you have it. As I said before, this is the first in a serious of Christmas Crochet Project roundups. Next time I’ll be sharing a whole bunch of my favourite amigurumi type patterns, *SWOON* including reindeer, snowmen, angels, gingerbread men, Santas, gnomes and more, so make sure you’re signed up for our email updates so you don’t miss out! Also, if you know of a free pattern for a gorgeous Christmas themed throw, blanket or afghan that I haven’t posted, please, PLEASE drop a link to it in the comments before so we can all have a look at it! Thanks, and keep stashing that yarn!

Tx

Subscribe NOW to receive your free printable gift tag

This free downloadable and printable gift tag lets the recipient of your amazing handmade crochet or knitted gift know that it was HANDMADE WITH LOVE, and gives care instructions. Print it out on any paper you choose and use it over and over again.

If you don’t know one end of a crochet hook from the other or worsted weight from DK yarn, but you want to make All Of The Pretty Crocheted things you see on Pinterest, then you’ve come to the right place!

I am a completely self-taught crocheter, and I spent many hours trawling online for how-to-crochet tutorials that dumbed things down enough for even my clumsy fingers. I found a great mix of photo tutorials and videos, and am delighted to share a few of these with you to help you get started.

I’ll admit there were moments of frustration (lots of them) and on occasion I had to pause and rewatch certain parts of a video up to 20 times before I could wrap my brain and fingers around the technique. That said, it’s been so, so worth it! Crochet is, for me, as good as meditation, and you end up with pretty things to keep, gift or sell, too!

This is going to be a three post series on Absolute Beginner Crochet, and I reckon the sensible place to start is to run through the equipment and supplies you’ll need. Just think of the lovely, lovely yarn stash you can start assembling!

Introduction To Crochet Supplies

AKA – Stashing for Beginners

HOOKS

As the name suggest, a hook is “that stick thing” you use to pull the yarn loops through each other to form the various stitches. They are available in a huge range of styles, materials, colours and sizes. You can get aluminium hooks, plastic, bamboo, wooden and more. The size varies according to the thickness of the yarn you will be using, and the bulkiness of the final stitch you’re after. There are teeny tiny hooks for working with delicate thread, up to giant ones for making hugely bulky and cuddly blankets (or slaying vampires, of course).

Now, of course it’s not just that simple! Different parts of the world use different measurement systems for sizing hooks, so here’s a handy comparison chart

Everyone is going to have their personal favourite style of hook, and I absolutely have mine. I’ve tried hundreds of hooks, and am yet to find one that’s better than the Clover Armour soft handled hooks. I don’t know what it is about them, but they fit so comfortably in your hand, and the brushed aluminium (or steel, no idea, it’s metal of some sort) is just so silky smooth to wrap your yarn around. I’m such a fan. You can get them in sets like those below, or individually. They’re definitely not the cheapest option out there, but they’re worth every penny.

As far as pretty hooks, I’ve seen some hand carved and coloured ones that are literally works of art. In fact I’m going to be cranking up a new Pinterest board soon JUST so that I can drool over the pretty hooks any time I want to.

Most crochet hooks work for any style of crochet, but there is one specialist type for doing what’s known as Tunisian crochet. It’s a bit longer, because in Tunisian crochet you keep the stitches on your hook sort of like you do with knitting. It’s also very cool and heaps of fun, and one day I *will* finish my daughter’s rainbow blanket crocheted in Tunisian stitch, I swear.

YARN

There are even more types of yarn than there are hooks, of course, and yarn, aka wool, is glorious, glorious stuff!

For the beginner crocheter you’ll probably find that you’ll work with either cotton, wool or acrylic yarn. There are others – bamboo, alpaca, yak (yup, yak), banana fibre, silk, hemp, and more. If it can be spun it’s been spun. Yes, that includes cat and dog hair, but I’m not sure about human hair. OK, I found out about human hair. It is a thing, it’s on YouTube here. O.M.G.

For now, though I’ll stick to the basics, starting with cotton. Cotton is a natural fibre, as you probably know, and is lovely to crochet with. It usually gives really good stitch definition and is pretty good at not splitting as you work with it. It has a lot less stretch to it than wool or acrylic, so is great for household items like dish cloths, baskets and spa goodies. It’s also pretty freaking tough when it comes to care, as most items can be machine washed and sometimes dried (check the label!).

Cotton is great for crocheted summer blankets, baby clothes, cardigans – pretty much anything. You can get it as fine as sewing thread right up to a rope-like thickness for baskets and mats. Here are a few I love using, you can click through on the images to see the full ranges available 🙂

Another fibre I love working with is pure wool. This can come from sheep, alpacas and many other beasties, but sheep wool is the most common. There are even lots of different varieties of sheep wool, all coming from different breeds of sheep. Here in Australia Merino is the most common breed, and it’s utterly gorgeous to crochet with. Baaaa-aaaa-aaaa.

Wool is renowned for being warm and cosy. Just as it keeps the little sheepies all toasty on the icy hillsides, so it will keep you and your loved ones warm. It has all sort of natural insulation properties that I don’t really understand, I just know them to be effective.

I just had to include the photo above in here, because I’m quite impressed with it. My 12 year old daughter was playing around with my camera phone and some of my stash yesterday and took this one. She also made me some other little “flat lay” type shots to use around the blog, so you’ll see more of those soon.

OK- back to wool. Wool has some natural stretch to it, and can sometimes be a bit coarser than other fibres, but there are also plenty of “supersoft” wool yarns available, too. It does tend to be a bit more expensive than other options, but trust me, it’s well worth the investment to make an heirloom blanket or sweater for yourself or your family. It also needs some special loving when it comes to washing – like, do NOT put it in the dryer, ever (unless the label says you can) and keep it on gentle cycles and that sort of thing. Or ask your mother to wash it.

I particularly like using wool to make my little amigurumi creations, as I find the slight coarseness of the fibre is great for making a tight stitch with no slipping, thereby avoiding seeing any stuffing between stitches.

Again, you can buy wool and wool blends at any store selling yarn, as well as hundreds of online stores like THIS one. See? I’m so helpful, aren’t I? And just a reminder, if you do end up purchasing anything at any of the places I’ve linked to I may get a teeny weeny commission, which costs you absolutely nothing, and helps me cover the cost of keeping this site up and running.

Acrylic is the most cost-effective and easy-care yarn out there, and also comes in the widest range of colours. It’s usually fairly lightweight, but can be very warm. There’s some stretch in it, which is great for clothing and other things you want to mould to a shape. Basically, it’s the cheap and cheerful option, and I love the stuff. Acrylic is usually pretty soft, too, and did I already mention the incredible range of colours you can get?

“Acrylic is known as a filament yarn. They make it by mixing chemicals, heating them to melting point and then forcing the liquid mix through tiny holes (like in a showerhead). When it drops through the holes it falls into air chambers where it cools and goes solid again.

After the filaments have cooled, they are either processed some more, or twisted into yarns and wound onto spools. The strength of the yarn is determined by the amount of twist put into the yarn, as with other fibers.”

Pretty cool, hey?

I could go into a heck of a lot more detail on types of yarn, but that about covers the very basics.

One thing I should also let you know is that yarn comes in what is called different “weight”. This basically refers to how thick it us, and different weights suit different crochet projects. Again, these “weights” rather inconveniently have different names around the world, so here’s another handy-dandy conversion chart to help unmuddle you.

That’s it for now, and next time I’ll be talking about my favourite photo and video Absolute Beginner Crochet tutorials. If there’s anything in particular you’d like me to be sure to cover, just pop a comment in the box below and I’ll make it happen.

Also, if you haven’t subscribed to Stashing Yarn yet, make sure you do that so you will get your own personal notification when the next post in this series is up and running.

Subscribe NOW to receive your free printable gift tag

This free downloadable and printable gift tag lets the recipient of your amazing handmade crochet or knitted gift know that it was HANDMADE WITH LOVE, and gives care instructions. Print it out on any paper you choose and use it over and over again.